Aromatherapy candles plus cabin fever. Whee...

Dec 15, 2001

I’ve not been updating as often this month. I could smudge the truth a little, and say it’s recovery from NaNoWriMo last month. I could smudge the truth a LOT, and say that my gift shopping is eating up all my time. (I’m perhaps a little over-organised: I got all my shopping done somewhere around August.) It’s a combination of a lot of things: taking a month off to just relax, doing a periodic inventory of my life in general (much easier to deal with when done in small doses), planning out content, thinking and writing, having the odd bit of fun, and dealing with cabin fever.

Y’see, the Stormy Season has hit with a vengeance. Rain 20 hours out of every 24. Winds clocked at 80km/hr, gusting up to 100km/hr.

My normal routine has been thrown out of whack. I like rain just fine…but true pouring rain makes my daily walks, part of which uses unpaved trails, a bit more accident-prone than I like. I’ve been stuck indoors for four days now, and I’m starting to go somewhat bugfuck. Yes, I’m a computer person, but while I don’t have the Home Gymnasium from Hell or go to a fitness club, I’m not sedentary. I go on hour-long walks (halfway between a power walk and a hike) almost every day. I need to do this, or I either sink into lethargy or start to get rabbitty. (If I’m really lucky, I do first one, then the other…truly a joy and a bliss.) I’ve got ideas chasing themselves around in my head, running in circles and completely wasting themselves before I can write them down. So today I tried structuring my surroundings a little. I did some tai chi, took an extra-long shower, drank some tea (no coffee), had a purposefully slow breakfast. The plan was to light some candles (I find them soothing), turn on a CD, read for a while, then fire up the computer and see how many ideas I could commit to data before my brain vapourlocked. It was a good plan. It was a nice plan. It was a plan that had proper table manners.

Problem is, the candle that I lit was a scented candle, a gift from my downstairs neighbour. It was peppermint-scented. Peppermint, for those not familiar with aromatherapy, is a stimulating, envigorating scent.

Okay, so pitch that “soothing” adjective from the scenario…and now I’m almost as twitchy as if I’d drunk four cups of coffee.

And it’s still pouring outside.

Keywords: | recovery | home | fire | candles | cabin fever |
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When corporations get pettish. Next, on the Faux channel.

Nov 23, 2001

Corporations appear to get more and more of a stranglehold on us every day. The general assumption when I was growing up and in my (hellish) job in retail was “The customer is always right”. Perhaps oversimplified, but it did point out that stores depend on us, not the other way around. (For one thing, we outnumber them.) Yet now companies spread disinformation and are lauded for being innovators? Or sue a dissatisfied consumer with claims of libel? (Looking over the incident, I’m not sure that word means what they think it means…but I digress.)

We all need to start thinking seriously about the companies from whom we buy things. With today’s interlocking, incestuous system of company ownerships, it may not be possible to totally cease giving money to any one company.

But we can damn sure cut down on how much they get.

Keywords: | public relations | marketing | customer service |
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